Does anybody have a gut feel for how long the power must be off before it no longer really matters?

I assume that at some point we would stop waiting for the lights to come back on and start to recraft our lives -- give up the generators and find permanent alternative heat sources, methods of food supply & preservation, stop wondering about that favorite sit-com, etc. When is that point when it stops being "endurance" and becomes "life"? One month? Two? Four?

And a follow up question -- does anyone have experience with prolonged power outages and have a sense of the group psychology associated with them? How long before civil people turn to competitive (i.e., UN-civil) survival mode?

I am asking because I am responsible for a medium-sized retirement community on California's central coast and do not want to be wondering about the answers on January 21st because it's STILL dark...

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

Answers

Ron,

You are really worrying about this matter. Look, you will get a lot of opinions, so here is mine. There have been power outages of 4-6 weeks in different areas due to weather related problems in the recent past, so you know that is quite survivable. There has been talk about the grid being a weak link, but there would still be local "islands" of power even in that case. Personally, I think the worst case scenario is something like what happens in Mexico or the Philippines, where power is on-again off-again, all the time. A day on, a day off, that sort of thing. I do not believe it will go off and stay off for months on end, but it may very well be rationed or sporatic until the various problems can be sorted out. That is my opinion of worst case. You will probably have a lot more headaches with fuel, banking, telephones, and food supply, than with electric power. I have a portable generator but I really don't think I will have to use it for more than some "fill in" periods.

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

Ron, the only people who have experiences with prolonged power outages in this country are those whose power was out because of a weather crisis of some kind (ice storm, hurricane, tornado, flood). In that type of crisis, there is always the underlying conviction that help IS on the way, solutions ARE being implemented, the crisis WILL end, and "normal" life will resume even if it takes weeks to accomplish. In this sense the group psychology remains very civil; stress levels are high, but people work together towards the goal of getting through a bad time. As long as the perception remains that whatever crisis is at hand will NOT continue indefinitely, but will gradually improve, then there is quite a lot of evidence that people's endurance is very great indeed.

You should realize that I'm writing in general terms, here. I think we are all aware of news reports about shops being looted even after only half an hour (or less) of any power outage. Indisputably there are always elements in any society which will take advantage of perceived weaknesses or opportunities for potential gain for themselves. This is part and parcel of our everyday lives, irrespective of any crisis situation.

The only kinds of situations I'm aware of (from a historical standpoint), where endurance turned into a regional or broad-based survival mode, occurred when uncertainty about recovery was rife and there was a change in _perception_. This has happened in times of war, when certainty about an outcome is naturally difficult to have or maintain, and it has happened during long-term economic downturns, such as the Depression of the 1930's, when gradually the expectation for a short term recovery gave way to a "when will it stop getting worse?" type of despaired questioning. Even in these cases, however, large segments of society still hung on to hope and continued to _endure_.

It has been postulated by some that prior generations had much more of a faith and self-sufficiency-based outlook than it appears we have now. I don't know if the presumption that people would now handle any long term crisis which presents itself in a less responsible manner will be true or not. I do know that the citizens of the "Roaring Twenties" were just as taken by surprise when the economy went south as most people would be today.

I personally think the evidence suggests that bad times tend to bring out the best in people, not the worst, regardless of their prior thought patterns. You mentioned that you're responsible for a retirement community. I hope you realize that your community likely has a far higher percentage of experienced "endurers" than the general population. I'll bet they could tell you lots of stories about how to get through all sorts of bad times! I'd also bet they know how to do it while still keeping a hopeful outlook on life, and having some laughs along the way. Got a deck of playing cards? Cheap entertainment. Family sing-alongs in the thirties and war years didn't just happen - it was a way to lift the spirits.

I personally do not think there will be prolonged power outages of the time frames you're speaking about, but there is a caveat to this. The caveat is that my opinion does not include any potential damage to utilities or distribution networks by any group with a terrorist agenda. Actual physical damage to any infrastructure area isn't something you or I can make any guesstimates about, and although we don't like to think of it, that possibility exists at any time, not just at the rollover to 2000. I do think there is a great chance we will experience a serious economic downturn, but that's a topic for another forum.

You have my admiration for taking your responsibilities to the community seriously and for mulling over possibilities and seeking answers.

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

Ron,

At work I have never been accused of exercising self-denial in expressing my gut feeling about any subject. Particularly when it comes to our serving our customers. But I have to tell you Ron, these questions stopped me cold. However, I thought about your questions at length and returned to the forum to cut and paste your post so that I could better attempt to provide you with a responsible response. I sincerely understand and appreciate your obvious concern for your retirement community but if your fears are this deep, please talk to your local utility. Ask questions and demand answers when necessary. You have the right to know what their status is and if they are not forthcoming, call your states public service commission! They generally seem to get answers rather quickly.

Based on my experiences in utility operations and power restoration, I dont believe that there is a time limit beyond which we would, individually or as a nation, determine that it is necessary for us to re-craft our lives. I just dont think were built that way. If there is a limit, I believe that trigger is heavily dependent on the conditions one and/or ones family would have to endure before that decision would thrust itself upon you or us. It has been my experience that people differ so widely in their response to adversity that a clear and definable picture or time frame is impractical at best and impossible at the worst. Generally, people just want to know what they can expect and when can they expect it so they can prepare. This is not an unreasonable request.

I tend to agree with Gordon as to his worst case scenario with, perhaps, one single adjustment. I think that there may be islands of outages but that the bulk of the national transmission system will remain intact and functioning. I respectfully disagree with Gordon that power will be cycled on and off daily but I can see that and rationing in some areas where demand is exceptionally high due to winter peaking. I do, wholeheartedly, agree with him that outages lasting months is not realistic at this juncture.

I hope this makes you feel a little better but only your utility can eliminate the dread you seem to feel. Call them!

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

Hi Ron,

Central coast of California is beautiful and winters are pretty doggone mild too! Nice place to retire.

I wouldn't get too terribly worked up but rather make some sensible plans, including water which can be scarce around your parts. If you have special electricity needs like for medical stuff I would get in touch with the utility company and discuss the matters with them. Hopefully they'd be honest with you. You're gonna have to make some judgement calls on that.

You should already have some major earthquake preparedness in place and that will go a long way towards preparing you for any potential Y2K disruptions in supplies. If you don't have that then you can really easily justify "Y2K" preparedness by calling it "Earthquake" preparedness.

How close to San Luis Obispo are you?

Steve

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

Ron,

Here's a tidbit for you;

"Preventing problems before they start, and developing contingency plans when necessary, are still the best solutions to the Y2K problem".

WILLIAM J. CLINTON July 20, 1999

That holds true for that overdue "Great Quake" too.

At this point most of us have about as much influence on "preventing Y2K problems" as we do on preventing an earthquake. (or hurricane, tornado, blizzard, ice storm, etc.) Making contingency plans and preparing for any of the above will be much more productive and satisfying.

Does that Los Angeles fireman still come on television out there and show everyone how to prepare? Store water, food, flashlights, general camping gear etc. Be prepared to go it alone for how many days is it?

Although I didn't really need them after the Northridge quake I had some of my preps in place. Electricity was only out a few hours. Gas stayed on. Stores stayed open for the most part. Still, there was a lot of disaster.

Had it been a great quake, an 8.5 on the Richter scale? I'm sure most of L.A. would've been cut off from the stuff we've come to depend on. Who knows how long electricity would be out? Roads cut, etc...

You know, even if nothing at all happens due to Y2K you really aught to give some thought to preps for the occassional random natural.

Steve

-- Anonymous, July 21, 1999

I hope you community is a gated one. That alone will tend to give people a sense of calm in their homes. You have the opportunity with a community already in place, to do some brainstorming and prepping with your people. Might get in some outside speakers. I would be more worried about them not getting their pension checks and SS checks. Most of these people have some experience of "hard knocks and times" under their belts. I would bet that were they informed of what might happen, they would take the ball and run with it.

Good Luck....Taz

-- Anonymous, July 22, 1999

Ron,

If you can find one - get a copy of the March issue of WIRED magazine. The cover is completely black and the title is something like, "When the Lights Went Out." (I think it was available on line.) Anyway, the magazine covered various power outage scenarios - the Northeast and Canada's six-week power outage during the ice storm and New Zealand's long power outage a couple of years ago. The stories were about people - a mayor in a small town recounted his experience, a hospital administrator told about the hospital's preparations and the things they would do if they could do it over. Very insightful! I gave a copy to our local hospital's risk officer. There was quite a bit about the psychological effects of the storm and outages.

Good luck!

Terri Reid

-- Anonymous, July 22, 1999

The Wired issue is April's.

Wired Magazine Issue 7.04

-- Anonymous, July 22, 1999

Thanks for the info

The April WIRED article helped me a lot. I realized that if Canadians can lose power for some five weeks in the dead of winter and still survive (albeit a little worse for wear), we will be able to -- WITH proper planning (which we ARE doing) -- hang in there with little human damage along the way. The consensus also seems to be that in a community like our, where there is a strong sense of connectedness between people, corporate adversity breeds corporate solutions.

I'm not encouraged by recent news and do not expect that the power will be reliable or even present for some time during the coming winter. However, I AM encouraged that it will return, like Douglas MacArthur...it may take a while, but it'll be back.

Ron c[R]

-- Anonymous, August 03, 1999

Supposedly the Red Cross has recently said that people who are prepared for an ICE STORM or TORNADO are prepared for Y2K. If.. IF.. this is true (I haven't seen it on their website, but heard the report on Y2K News Radio), then this seems to be a major shift in expectations. Reading the reports of the big Ice Storm of 98 should give you some indication of how people reacted to that prolonged outage. Of course they received help from all over the country... that might not be the case if outages are widespread.. or if outages are complicated by storm damage.. or if Y2K outages are complicated by terrorist shenanigans.. or...

Link to TB2000 discussion of the Red Cross Statement etc.

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

From a refining and pipeline standpoint, this issue is critical. Let's start with the refinery. A refinery can (as many do from time to time) cope with a power outage/interruption depending on the nature of the interruption. Let me clarify, planned interruptions are vastly different from unplanned. An unplanned power failure can easily cripple refinery equipement and potentially result in fatal accidents. Nobody in the industry likes coping with them, but they are a fact of refinery life (indeed Chevron recently had a problem at their El Segundo CA plant that was caused by a squirrel who became a crispy critter on a power line). The fact that we don't see more problems than we do is testimony to the industry's safety oriented stance. That being said, unplanned outages are exceedingly dangerous events in refining. I won't bore you with the explanations of pressures and processes, but look at it like this: "You're heating crude oil to 900 degrees using complex compounds and chemicals to produce volatile mixtures like gasoline and naptha, if you suddenly stop doing that it creates big problemos."

Now the other issue for refineries regarding power is extended power outages resulting in damaged units. This scenario will be most critical in PADDs 1 & 2 (Northeast US and Chicago midsection). The deal here is that refineries have a harder time with staying in reasonable operating condition during the dead of winter. Hence the reason you don't see a hell of a lot of turnarounds during that time period. For one thing, many times someone's gotta go out and take care of the valve, line, etc. manually. This is not a fun thing during a cold weather event.

Now, on to the pipelines. Your primary concern here will be crude lines and tankage. There are a gazillion lines carrying a lot of crude here in the US. Some are heated and some are not depending on where they're located. Most of the Eastern Seaboard and All of the Chicago area refineries are served by pipe. I have said before, that if there are lot's of smaller county power interruptions here, you will have big problems. Pipes can turn into what is commonly referred to in the industry as a "candle" when they shut down with a certain API crude in them with no heat or movement for a long time. They set up and produce "pipe turds" (sorry, but that's really what we call em). Also, marine ports rely on pumps and pipes to move the crude from the ship to the tank to the refinery. No juice = no crude = big problems.

(PS you don't have to really be concerned about a gasoline pipeline [like say the Buckeye or Colonial] running into this problem as the products shipped wont gum up the lines if shut down)

-- Anonymous, July 27, 1999

Forgot to add this. I recently heard that at least one major products pipeline in the US will be shutting down for 24 hrs through the transition. I found this to be quite an unsettling development. While I think it prudent on their part, it is unnerving from a logistical standpoint. For example this will occur at a time when we (in the refining industry) already expect panic demand spikes. This is not when you want to suspend pipe movements. Not to mention the precedent it could set. However, after Bellingham I can't think anyone is going to take any chances whatsoever.

PS-IT's great to see the forum in the shape it's in. Seems like it was when I first came here a while back. Again, we're all in this together.

-- Anonymous, July 27, 1999

Hence the reason you don't see a hell of a lot of turnarounds during that time period.

Sorry, but I can't quite figure out what "turnarounds" means in this context. Equipment replacement?

-- Anonymous, July 28, 1999

A turnaround generally refers to routine maintenance and equipment swaps. These events typically last anywhere from 1 week to two months depending on the work to be done. The idea is that you want to be running reliably all of the time, but you need to do some work on things once in a while to keep the system smooth. So you schedule a planned outage in which you execute a controlled shutdown of the plant (or in some cases a partial shutdown) and then your boys get in there and get to work fixing stuff.

The most critical times in a turnaround are the front and back ends. You have to be quite careful in how you turn things off and then how you bring them back up. Do it wrong and you can blow millions in minutes.

-- Anonymous, July 28, 1999

Do it wrong and you can blow millions in minutes.

That would be millions of dollars, right? ;-)

-- Anonymous, August 03, 1999

How did Ron's post dated 3 Aug get inserted after Lane Core's post of July 22nd and before Linda's post of July 23rd?

Anyone else confused?......

-- Anonymous, August 03, 1999

Whoa. That is strange (the dates, I mean). Must have been a database fart or something. Take a look at the source for this particular page, and tell me what you see different in Ron's post -vs- the others (hint - it has to do with using HTML heading tags). The database that generates the HTML apparently doesn't expect to see (or doesn't know how to treat) heading tags like that, and it apparently threw the DB for a loop when the DB tried to position the posting on the page. Ah, what strange and wonderful things can happen when we rely on computers to do the right thing....

(This is not the first database initiated burp that has occured in this forum.)

-- Anonymous, August 03, 1999